


high for this

by temerity (forsanethaec)



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: First Time, M/M, Marijuana, Recreational Drug Use, Shotgunning, Stoned Sex, Tour Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-09-08
Updated: 2013-09-08
Packaged: 2017-12-25 22:57:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/958601
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/forsanethaec/pseuds/temerity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Niall tags along while Louis smokes weed during the European tour leg, and everything is more complicated than it needs to be.</p>
            </blockquote>





	high for this

**Author's Note:**

> huge love to [lucy/psycholinguistic](http://psycholinguistic.tumblr.com/) for forcing me to finish this and reassuring me that it didn't have an anti-drug message because clearly that ain't what i'm about. title provided by the inimitable [julia/myownremedy](http://eisenbergandelephants.tumblr.com/). this fic is dedicated to my new bowl, aka "louis 'blaze blunts' the tommo tomlinson's smoke weed every day." peace

Niall can tell someone's hotboxing their bunk the second he wakes up on the moving bus, because curtains don't make a very good seal, and it's too quiet besides. He pokes his head out and sees the door to the back lounge open and Zayn on the couch, asleep in the low dark on Liam's shoulder. Liam looks up at Niall's appearance, waves, then looks back down at his phone, face awash in the blue glow of Twitter. Harry's with the crew, and he doesn't smoke anyway, which leaves Louis. Not much of a surprise. 

Niall climbs down and stands on tiptoe to say into the curtain around Louis' bed across from him, "Oi, Louis." There's an answering grunt, and Niall pokes his head in. The small space is like a steam room, and Niall coughs, waving his hand in front of his face. Louis sits upright with a thick gasp. 

"Shut the thing," he mumbles, then drops back down. 

Niall climbs all the way in, hunched beside Louis' legs, and tugs the curtain closed. Louis has his iPhone on as a light, and he's mouthing around the last of a joint, an ashtray in the form of a jar lid balanced on his chest.

"You're wasting most of it," Niall says, waving his hand again to clear some space to talk. Louis puffs at the roach, which sizzles abortively and goes out against his calloused fingertips. He stubs it out. 

"You don't even smoke," Louis tells him, pointing, his fingers black and sharp with ash. "You're gonna get a contact high."

"I'm always contact-high around you lads," Niall says, smiling crookedly. He can feel the secondhand smoke behind his eyes, and he's glad Louis had been finishing the joint as he came in, so he didn't have to turn down a toke of it and hurt Louis' feelings. "You alright, then?" he asks.

"I'm ups and downs," Louis says on a sigh. He props himself up a little against the back of the bunk, arms behind his head like he's showing off his tattoos for a photoshoot. Niall chews on his lower lip as he looks them over, a map of familiar black scrawlings. _Far Away_. 

"This is mostly for sleep right now," Louis says. 

"That's what I was doing, sleeping." 

"Til what?"

Niall laughs. "Til I came over here, is what. Don't you wake up all fuzzy if you smoke before bed?" 

"No more than 'cause I'm sleeping on the fucking bus," Louis says. He pulls his legs under him, regarding Niall with slow eyes and a lazy grin. "Or 'cause I'm sleeping, like, never." 

"You trying to tell me to fuck off?"

"Nah," Louis says. "Never." He giggles a bit and pats the narrow space beside him on top of the bedspread. The smoke has mostly eked out from the gap in the bottom of the curtain, and Niall doesn't really feel high, though he doesn't really know what that feels like, either. He's never actually been high on purpose. He crawls up beside Louis and settles back, aware of the points where they're touching and the points where they're not, of the layer of haze at the top of the small enclosure, of the sounds of Louis' measured breathing and his own. 

"You want another one?" Louis asks after a while. "There's some more in Zayn's kit." 

"He's asleep." This makes Louis laugh, a quick shake of his shoulders. "Nah, but no thanks," Niall says. "Didn't have the first one, did I?" 

Louis hums high up in the back of his throat. "True," he says. His eyes slide closed. "You've got to sometime," he murmurs, then hums again like a purring cat. Niall knows from the way his voice is fading that he's already half-asleep. "You'll like it. I'd love to see you proper stoned, Niall." 

"Sometime," Niall murmurs. He turns a quarter of the way onto his side toward Louis, studies his face drawn with tiredness, inhales and gets a whiff of the smell of weed on his hair. He picks the ashtray up off Louis' chest with thumb and middle finger -- Louis doesn't move -- and after a moment he pulls the curtain back and swings his legs down. 

He chats to Liam in the back for a while until Zayn wakes with a start and demands, zombie-like, that everyone go to bed immediately, and then he lies awake in his bunk for longer after, focused on the scent of smoke lingering from across the aisle, picturing Louis, asleep and stoned, an arm's reach away. 

*

The smell that stays on the bus and Louis and sometimes Zayn and Liam is a continued distraction for Niall as they traverse the European tour leg, but he's not going to be the dick who brings it up with anyone responsible. It's not actually annoying him; it's just kind of preoccupying, like a curiosity. He finally asks Harry one day on the other bus just because. Harry, who seems stoned all the time, but Niall knows he isn't. 

"You don't ever smoke up with Louis and that lot, do you?"

Harry's eyebrows draw together. 

"No," he says, "I don't really want to."

Niall wishes he could be more like Harry, making some peace with not wanting the things he tells himself he shouldn't. 

"You could," Harry says. He's got a sly smile starting in one side of his mouth. 

"Oh, you think you can read my mind," Niall says. "Go on." It's more dismissive than he's feeling. 

Harry shakes his hair out of his face. "Only if you want to. You seem like you might. If you wanna do something, you shouldn't stop yourself, you know?"

"Wise words, bro." Niall’s being flip, but he knows Harry knows he means it. Harry smiles at him, sinks down lower in his chair and stretches out a boot-clad toe until it nudges Niall's calf. 

"Even Liam has a few times," Harry says belatedly. Niall just laughs. He knows it's true, but honestly, it's a bit ridiculous. 

*

They go shopping in Amsterdam, and Louis has one of the crew buy him a new pipe -- not too big, good for a small group, he says excitedly, with swirls of orange and blue and speckled golden green across its round glass edges, into the carb and down the sides of the bowl. Even Niall can sort of appreciate that it's gorgeous. 

They're all in a blessed hotel a few nights later, even the bus contingent, for once. But it's a quiet night, and Niall's having no luck padding room to room looking for someone to talk to. Liam's in bed half-asleep. Niall spread-eagles above the sheets and half on top of him for a bit, trying to get him to liven up, but it doesn't work.

"Paaaayno," he says, making a snow angel in the bedding. "I'm bored. Entertain me." 

"Go sleep."

"Can't."

"You haven't even tried," Liam mumbles, rolling over as he tries to extricate himself from Niall's weight. "You ought to go bother Louis, I think he's still up." 

"Oh." Niall stills. "Where? Didn't see him in his room." 

"He was on the balcony when I left. Bonding with his new piece."

"Are _you_ stoned now?" A smile twitches across Liam's sleepy mouth, and Niall laughs. "Hey, you wear it well."

"Thank you." Liam's smile widens and he closes his eyes, seeming pleased. "I only had one hit, it helps me sleep." He coughs pointedly. 

"Yeah, alright." Niall gives Liam a goodnight raspberry on his cheek and leaves him squirming into the pillows. 

Louis is high on the bus a lot, more than Zayn, for sure, but he doesn't smoke as often off it, which is why Niall is a little surprised by this whole thing. But he's out there on the balcony sure enough when Niall lets himself into his room, easier to see now that Niall knows where to look. 

They're on the top floor and the city is twinkling anonymously out below them. Louis is leaning on the railing, barefoot, staring. He doesn't startle when Niall sidles up to him. 

"Alright, Tommo?"

"Yeah, okay," Louis says. He turns his head, resting his chin on his shoulder and looking at Niall. "You up?" 

"For a while," Niall says. "What a view, eh." 

"It's mad," Louis says dully. There's a little smile on his mouth, his eyes lidded and red. He's clutching the new bowl, half unsmoked, in his palm.

"Smoking a lot by yourself lately, aren't you," Niall says. There's no thought behind it, just an observation, but he winces internally to hear how it sounds. 

Louis tuts softly. "I'd think you were judging me, but you always seem to be around when I'm doing it, eh, _Neil_ ," he says. Niall laughs, and then so does Louis; their practiced onstage jokes seem far funnier when used in private. "So I'm not smoking by myself. I'm with you, _and_ I'm smoking. There's a difference." 

"Oh, sure."

"You want a hit, then?"

"Christ, Louis," Niall says, but he smiling. "I think I'm good. I'm just hanging out." 

"You mind if I do?"

"'Course not."

Louis digs his silver Zippo out of his pocket and sparks the little bowl up again. Niall watches the ash flare deep down in it, illuminating invisible colors. He watches Louis' lips sealed around the end of it, his eyes nearly crossed, the complicated hand position -- watches the deep inhale, Louis' hollowed cheeks, how he lets his eyes slip closed as he holds it in his lungs. Then the smoke pushing out of his mouth, some curling over his stubbly upper lip, the rest dissipating into the clear night. 

Niall hugs himself to keep the chill out and leans forward against the railing while Louis breathes slowly beside him. He can pretend he's an observer when he studies Louis, gathering the ins and outs of smoking weed as though from curiosity or for reference. But it's probably obvious what he's really looking at.

"Learning the trade, Niall?" Louis asks then, smiling a little. He steps sideways and hip-checks him, then throws an arm around his shoulders. Niall feels unbidden heat in his cheeks. He shrugs. 

Louis considers him for a moment, that deep, hooded kind of look that freezes Niall on the spot. He stares back. "You've been kind of--" Louis starts finally, then stops, frowning in concentration. "Are you mad at me?" 

"What?" Niall says. "No, 'course not." 

"If you don't like it, you know, if it's --" he steps back, the absence of his arm leaving Niall's shoulders cold. Louis hunches, apologetic. "You don't have to come 'round," he mutters.

"Louis," Niall says. "It's _you_. I don't... y'know, it doesn't matter. I like being with you." He kicks at the railing. "I mean, I'll go if I'm a downer or whatever." The awkward feeling is compounding itself. He sounds like an idiot, but he doesn't know what he wants to say. 

"No," Louis says, frowning still. "You're not." 

Niall thinks he knows what they might be getting at: that there's been a certain distance between them lately, one they don't really have with the others or even on stage. It's a private disconnect, one that has a hell of a lot less to do with the weed than Niall cares to admit.

"You want a shotgun?" Louis asks. His voice has a false brightness, suddenly, too awake for the night and the dark balcony and the smell of pot. Niall shakes his head hesitantly, suppressing a slight shiver at the thought of being that close to Louis, close enough to see his pores and the shadows of his eyelashes, the thick smoke curling from Louis' mouth into his own,. 

"Please?" Louis murmurs. "Not if you really don't want to. But I want to." He laughs, blinking; inspiration has apparently struck. "I _really_ want to," he says in his Best Song Ever voice. "But what about Brad?" Niall laughs. 

"No," Louis says once he's done giggling at himself, "no, but it won't be that much. I promise." He looks so hopeful. Niall realizes then that there's no way he can say no to Louis, especially not with a face like that.

"Can I see it?" Niall asks, motioning to the bowl. Louis nods eagerly. Niall picks it up, runs his thumb over the dip in its side, over the opening at the end and the lip of the carb, feeling tendrils of smooth glass.

"Ah, go on, then," he says, heart jumping a little. "Only for you." 

It's worth it instantly to see how Louis' face lights up. He takes the bowl back. "Just breathe in when I breathe out," he says. Niall salutes. 

Louis lights the bowl and sucks his hit into his mouth, then touches Niall's cheek, leaning in. He presses their parted lips together, soft and still. Niall is concentrating too hard to be surprised. He doesn't know what to do with his hands, which are itching to pull Louis closer by the hips or the back of his neck. It happens quickly and isn't really a kiss, but Niall's eyes are closed and his head is spinning as Louis breathes out and Niall inhales, sharp, feeling the smoke itch when it hits his lungs. It's not so odd a sensation as the warmth of Louis' mouth on his own. 

Louis draws back but lingers close, head cocked.

"You look like a dog," Niall says on a gasp out of smoke. "Fuck." He coughs once, then again, harder. "With your face like that." He mimes Louis' expression, and Louis laughs. 

"I do not," he snickers. "You're shit at smoking weed, how about that." 

"Got a lot to live up to," Niall says, inclining his head toward Louis. He swallows hard around another tickle in his throat and licks his lips, which taste of weed and Louis. Then they're in silence, and Niall's thinking about how ridiculous it is that he just did that, that he wouldn't have done for anyone else, probably. 

"I'd thought it would be, like." He cups his hands in a tunnel around his mouth. 

"My way's much more effective," Louis smirks. "You wanna go again?" he asks, sliding a warm hand around the back of Niall's neck and squeezing. His eyes are lidded, the shadows of too many nights like this on the skin beneath them, and he's just looking at Niall like he could keep looking forever.

"Yeah, I suppose," Niall laughs and looks away just to break the silence. "You're ridiculous, Louis." 

But Louis draws back. "I'm worried you don't want to," he says. "Fuck, I'm being a dick, aren't I?" 

"Louis, honestly -- whatever you want to do, I'm down."

Louis considers him, then nods like he gets it. "Okay," he says. "You're a good lad." 

He lights the bowl again and takes a hit as Niall watches. The trepidation is tempered by something else this time, a warm-edged excitement. Then Louis reaches out. 

"C'mere," he says, speaking thin-lipped around his hit like a ventriloquist, and he leans in. 

Niall tilts his chin into the odd half-kiss, aware of the warmth of Louis' mouth, his hand coming around Niall's shoulders. He inhales, wondering if Louis can feel his heart beating rabbit-quick. It's supposed to end then, only a couple of seconds later, but it doesn't. Louis' tongue swipes against his lower lip gently, and Niall steadies himself with a hand at Louis' waist and suddenly, seamlessly, they're actually kissing. 

There's a split second where Louis pulls back to breathe and Niall gasps out his hit before their mouths are back together, and Niall's foggy brain is catching up with this, his fingers curling in Louis' shirt, the other hand sliding into his hair, pulling them closer together. He hears himself make a noise into Louis' mouth, feels their chests meet. Louis smells rough and warm and boyish and his mouth is soft and slicked by Niall's tongue, and it's different than Niall had imagined. And he has imagined it, he realizes. How odd. 

He mumbles something that's trying to be Louis' name and Louis makes a noise back that's like assent, and then he's stumbling over Niall's feet and pressing him into the railing.

"Wait," he says, and he pulls back, gasping a little. "I have to put this down." He holds up the bowl still clutched in his palm, grinning like an idiot, and Niall grins back, uncertain. The two-hit high in the back of his brain is being compounded by the tingling in his lips and the realization that he wants more of it, of Louis. 

Louis puts the bowl down on the railing while Niall watches him, then picks it up and puts it on the little table, then nudges it slightly until it's centered. The corner of Niall's mouth twitches. 

"Don't laugh at me," Louis says, turning. He steps into Niall's space, and he seems bigger than he is, more like his age, all bleary-eyed and good at being high. He touches the hem of Niall's t-shirt, then nuzzles into him, nosing beneath his chin.

"Ni-all," he sing-songs. He kisses the side of his neck, holding onto his shirt. 

"Lou-ee," Niall sings back on an almost-whisper. He wants to kiss him again, but he's not sure it's a good idea. Louis seems content this way, like this is a normal part of things. Maybe it is.

"D'you like it?" Louis asks, looking intently into Niall's face. Niall tries not to get distracted by his eyelashes. 

"Not sure I care much for the shotgunning," Niall says. "The breathing's a bit weird. I like the other part." He feels himself flushing. "The after part." 

Louis grins. "Me too," he murmurs. "Here," he says. He picks up the bowl and lights it again, pulls in his hit and beckons Niall in. 

It's all so strange that Niall just has to go with it, has to wait to figure it out later. Louis is soft and heavy against him, leaning him into the railing, and Niall's hands go to his hips, fingers sinking in. Louis hums and it makes Niall feel dizzy. He feels like he's slipping in and out of himself moment to moment, remembering with sharp clarity who he's kissing and then getting lost in it, Louis' lips on his, the catch of his teeth, one hand at the back of Niall's head and the other on his back just under his shirt.

It feels like forever before Louis pulls back, smoothing his hands down Niall's sides and making his body jump a little. "That was nice," he says, looking at Niall with that musing expression, an inscrutable little smile on his wet mouth. 

"Yeah," Niall says. He watches Louis step back, unsure what he's supposed to do now. 

"Do you feel good?" Louis shoves his hands into his pockets. 

"Yeah," Niall says again, frowning. Then he looks up and bursts out laughing. "I feel fine."

Louis ruffles his hair and gives him a tug on the ear and then a wet smooch on the cheek, grinning. "Proud of you, bro," he says. "You've just taken your first step into a larger world."

Silence for a moment, then Niall asks, "So d'you just hang out now, or?"

"Could go to bed." Louis shrugs, looking around. "It's kind of late. I don't know." 

"Could go to bed," Niall repeats. It sounds okay. "Yeah, I could." 

Louis grins. "Alright then," he says. He pushes Niall in front of him through the sliding door. 

They wind up just lying together, stripped down to boxers, stretched out and languid. Once Niall's body hits the mattress he knows he'll stay there for the rest of his life. 

"I like this," he says to the ceiling while Louis watches him, eyes hooded. "I see what you mean about the sleeping, like, I'm so fucking comfortable. It's crazy." 

"Crazy," Louis repeats on a yawn. He reaches out and boops Niall on the nose, then leans forward and kisses him lightly. "Stay," he murmurs, curling in, his eyes slipping shut. "For the night." 

"Okay," Niall whispers. He's warm all over, behind his eyes, beneath his skin. He settles closer into Louis, their knees brushing beneath the covers, and closes his eyes. 

*

Niall knows where he is when he wakes up, which is different from if he'd been wasted drunk the night before, but his mouth tastes god-awful, which is about the same. Louis is sprawled on his back an arm's length away, bare legs half out of the sheets. Niall blinks over at him, remembering, then rolls away and drags himself to the shower.

"D'you always make out with people when you're high?" he asks later. Louis looks up from where he's putting his suitcase back together. 

"You mean do _I_ , or, like, does _one_?"

Niall laughs. "Both." 

Louis shrugs. "No different than making out with someone anytime," he says, eyes on the shirt he's folding. "I think when you're high, you don't talk yourself out stuff you might otherwise. You just do it, know what I mean?" 

Niall gets it, but it doesn't really help.

*

_Niall! Come play guitar for us x :)_

He gets the text from Zayn on the other bus when they're at a gas station overnight and knows he and Louis must be stoned. He's on the chill bus with Harry and Liam, both of whom are asleep, and he's not sure what makes him get up, put on slippers and a shirt and grab his guitar, but he does it anyway. There's no one about - it's got to be past two in the morning, they aren't due at their next stop until after dawn, and he's schlepping over to the other bus to entertain his stoned bandmates. What a life.

"Ah, Niall!" Louis nearly falls off the couch trying to get up when Niall climbs aboard. "You came!" 

"Evening, lads," Niall says. He drops down between them, grabbing an unopened beer from the mess on the table.

Zayn grins lazily at him. "Were you sleeping?"

Niall shakes his head, plucking at a couple of strings. "Just waiting for you to call, Zayn," he says, tipping his head back and smiling. Louis pokes him in the stomach. 

"Play us something," he demands. "Wait, do you want to blaze?"

Niall plucks some more to keep his fingers busy. "Yeah, alright," he says after a moment, trying to sound casual. "I've -- er. Sure." He glances at Zayn. If he knows about anything, he isn't showing it. 

"I'll show you," Louis says. It's a different bowl than last time, complicated and pretty, probably Zayn's. Louis shows him where to put his fingers and tells him when to lift them off, when to breathe. 

"You light it for me," Niall says. Louis rolls his eyes, and Niall shrugs. "You won't get your concert if my hand's on fire." 

"Fair point," Zayn puts in from somewhere that seems very far away.

Louis is watching Niall's face as he lights the bowl. He touches his thumb when it's time to lift it off the carb, and murmurs, "That should do it," when it's time to stop inhaling. It works, in that Niall doesn't cough or anything. He still takes a hasty swig of beer once he's blown his hit out in a stream above Louis' head and toward the cracked-open back window. 

"You gonna do this often now, Niall?" Zayn asks. 

"I don't think so," Niall says. He glances at Louis, who's smiling just a little, a secret smile, eyes still on Niall's face. It makes him feel a bit fluttery. "Maybe just sometimes." 

"That's okay," Zayn says. "Play a bit of Drake, mate." 

Niall tools out a bit of "Hold On, We're Going Home," singing quietly with Zayn, their voices rough with smoking and sleeplessness, while Louis sparks up again next to him. It turns into a slow jams medley, mostly Usher and Frank Ocean and shit Zayn likes. Half the time Niall's just playing notes while Zayn sings mindlessly. It's lovely. He wishes they'd jam like this more often. Another upside to joining the smoking contingent, maybe. 

"Hey," Louis says, like he'd read his mind. "For you." There's smoke eking out of his mouth and nose when Niall turns to look, and Louis is leaning in and sealing their mouths together before Niall can even blink, breathing out his hit. Niall sucks it in easily, eyes slipping closed with his fingers still on the strings of his guitar. 

"Whoa," Zayn says from behind them, laughing a little. Niall feels the heat in his cheeks when he and Louis break apart. Louis looks unperturbed, but Zayn's eyebrows are raised. "What was that about?"

"Poor thing doesn't know how to do it," Louis says. He reaches out and tweaks at one of Niall's nipples until Niall twists away. Zayn just raises his hands, shrugging.

"Sure, yeah," he says. Niall's grateful Zayn's stoned, so that he doesn't press the point. 

Niall segues into John Mayer, "Who Says" and "Why Georgia," concentrating on the sound, the vibrating strings under his fingers. He wonders if Louis and Zayn are having some kind of silent conversation over the top of his head. It occurs to him belatedly that he's stuck on this bus for the rest of the night, and the thought sends a thrill through his chest for some reason. 

"Right, lads," Zayn says finally, once he's finished his beer. "I'm off. Stay out of trouble."

Louis gives him a fistbump. "Night, man," he says.

"Sweet dreams," Niall says. He plays a chord that sounds like sweet dreams to him, and Zayn laughs and shuffles off to his bunk toward the front. He leaves the lounge door open. 

Niall had told himself he wouldn't get all weird when it was just him and Louis, which means he immediately feels intensely weird. Louis is giving him that same intent look he'd had back on the balcony at the hotel in Amsterdam.

"Play me something, Niall," he murmurs finally. 

Niall finishes his beer. "I've been playing," he murmurs back. "Zayn's asleep."

"Play something sleepy, then." 

It takes Niall a bit of thinking to settle on a song. He thinks it must be the tiredness and the beer making his two hits feel like more than that, or else it's Louis' soft presence all curled up and cozied close beside him on the couch. 

He plays a Script tune, "I'm Yours," which is desperately sappy but has a lullaby-ish feel to it. He sings under his breath: verse, chorus. When he looks up he has the sense that Louis hasn't taken his eyes off him the whole time. 

"You know you're quite good," Louis says. "You do know, don't you, Niall?"

Niall shrugs, flushed. 

"Don't do that." Louis is almost whispering. He shifts closer, eyes intent on Niall's face, and puts a hand on his knee like it's for emphasis. "You are, you're really good." 

"Thanks," Niall whispers. He feels his mouth twitch up in the corner, and Louis' does the same, but neither of them laugh.

They stare at each other a moment longer before Niall sets the guitar down against the corner of the couch, helpless with expectation. Louis follows the movement, watches as he straightens up. Then he leans in to kiss him. 

It feels amazing to do this again, and Niall doesn't know why he'd thought it would be a one-time thing. He cups Louis' cheek, tangles his fingers in his hair and pulls him closer, and the hand Louis had on his knee skates higher until it's at his hip, thumbing up under his shirt. Louis is leaning full over him, and Niall thinks they must be noisy, kissing sounds and rough breathing. The adrenaline at the thought of being found out makes him hot all over, and for some reason he's trying to tug Louis into his lap rather than pulling away. 

Louis slips a knee between Niall's thighs so that he's up half on top of him, looking down with his bloodshot eyes and an easy, devilish grin. 

"Are we going to make a habit of this?" he breathes, dragging his blunt nails down Niall's chest through his shirt. 

"I was going to ask you that," Niall says. He can feel that Louis is half-hard against his thigh, and he's emboldened by the thought that this _could_ be a habit, like being high is an excuse. He grabs hold of Louis' hips and pulls.

"Shit," Louis gasps. He wraps his arms around Niall's neck and does it again himself, rolling his hips forward. It brings his thigh up against Niall's dick and Niall swallows down a noise, tightening the brace of his legs around Louis'. 

Louis ruts against him again, starting to whine just the tiniest bit, frustrated, hoarse noises from the back of his throat into Niall's ear. They can't find a good rhythm or a good angle and Niall is still too hot to want to get up and find somewhere better for this. He feels adhered to Louis, arms a vice grip around his lower back, like he can't let go until they both get off. He mouths at Louis' neck because it's there, just enough to leave red marks that fade once he pulls back. Louis is breathing harshly into his hair. The sound is muffled in the quiet space around them, and Niall wonders what Zayn and the few hopefully sleeping crew members up front can hear. 

"Louis, we should --" he thinks _shut the door_ , but he says, "go to bed, maybe."

Louis collapses against him with a choked-off gasp. "Fuck, fuck, I need to get off," he breathes, hips still ticking aimlessly against Niall. He kisses him again, fingers tight in his hair, then sits back. "C'mon."

Louis' bunk is blessedly farther back than most of the occupied ones, and Niall climbs in awkwardly after him and shuts the curtains tight. It's pitch-dark, and the musty smell of the slept-in sheets makes Niall feel light-headed. He's crouched over Louis, and he thinks they must be staring at each other, but his eyes haven't adjusted all the way yet. 

Louis is shuffling around beneath him. "Take your sweatpants off," he breathes. He touches Niall's side, fingers skating up his ribs, then pulls Niall's shirt over his head. Niall does the rest. He's shaking, suddenly, able to see the dim outline of Louis in the dark. He's in black briefs, not boxers like the last time they'd just slept together, and from this angle he looks younger than he is, small and soft. 

"Tell me if it's too much," he whispers. 

"No," Niall says, "no, I -- oh." He shuts his mouth around the sound as Louis palms him through his boxers, then shoves them down his pale thighs and takes him in hand. Niall swears he's drawing blood biting his own lip as he tries not to make noise. He shifts closer to Louis, feels around in the dark until he feels the outline of his dick in his briefs and rubs at it. There's a wet spot at the tip. 

"We have to be quiet," Louis whispers, just as Niall says, "Wanna suck you off," and everything stops. 

"Can I?" he asks.

"God," Louis says. "Do you think about this when you aren't high?" His fingers are still wrapped around Niall's dick and he squeezes absently, so that Niall is gasping as he answers. 

"I don't know." 

"Me neither," Louis says. He sounds a bit anxious. "Yeah, go on," he says, but then he's pulling Niall in for a kiss. He sucks on his lower lip, already plumped up and red from Niall biting it trying to keep quiet. "Shh," Louis says, then pushes Niall down between his legs. "Go on, fuck, Niall." 

Niall tugs the briefs down around Louis' thighs, then pulls them all the way off on second thought and discards them somewhere in the bedclothes. Louis' knees drop as wide open as they can in the narrow space. His dick is fat and hard against the crease of his thigh, and he tangles his fingers in Niall's hair on top of his head. 

"I've haven't, before," Niall breathes. 

"I've never had a blowjob while I was high," Louis says. Niall's not sure he heard him. 

"Really?"

"Nah, bro," Louis scoffs like Niall wouldn't assume he does this often, given what they've done Niall's first and second time ever smoking. 

"Right," Niall murmurs. He thumbs against the soft inside of Louis' thighs, high up where they're warm, feeling the muscles jump beneath his fingers. Louis' dick is hot to the touch, and Niall licks his palm and pumps it in his fist a few times, flicks his tongue out to taste the tip, salivating. He knows people get cotton mouth when they're stoned, but it seems easily overcome around Louis. He holds him steady at the base and slides his lips down an inch, sucking. The taste is mesmerizing. He slides down lower, bobbing his head like he thinks he ought to. 

Louis had been close even back when they were on the couch and it feels like he's close again now, gripping in Niall's hair in time with the vague rhythm of his mouth. Niall slides a hand under Louis' thick thigh, hefts his leg over one shoulder so he can get a hand beneath his balls, pressing his mouth down lower, trying to be creative. He's breathing loud through his nose and knows it but he can't stop, not when Louis is trembling like this, falling apart. It's addictive, knowing he's the one making that happen, feeling things under his hands that he's probably wanked over and then forcibly forgotten in the past. 

Louis' thighs are tight around his shoulders, one heel digging into Niall's bare back. 

"Yeah," he breathes. "Like that." Niall shivers and sucks him against the flat of his tongue, trying to keep his stomach muscles tense to take him deeper. His throat is already raw from the weed and it's turning into an ache now, a good one. 

He lifts off enough to get his tongue into the slit so that Louis makes a little noise, high and wild in his throat. 

"Shh," Niall says. His eyes are watering. He pets at the backs of Louis' thighs, licking up the underside of his cock. Louis' stomach is quivering when Niall looks up at him.

"You look so fucking good down there," Louis whispers.

Niall's dick is pressed tight against his stomach where he's kneeling between Louis' legs, and he shifts, trying to find some friction. "I wanna make you come," he mutters, then drops his head, blushing furiously. 

"Almost there, babe," Louis gasps. He pulls Niall by the hair and Niall lets him, lets himself be guided back down onto Louis' cock with his lips tight against his teeth. He sucks him as deep as he can, then lets off and finds the vein with his tongue, working at it, feeling Louis' balls going tight in his hand. 

"Okay, okay," Louis gets out. The words turn to breathless giggles for a minute before his face goes pinched again, his head thrown back. Niall pulls off and starts to jack him off, holding him by the hip with his free hand. He wants to see it, wants to know what Louis looks like, wants to get to keep that image -- and he does a moment later, when Louis meets his eyes for half a second and then squeezes them shut, mouth falling open, his hips pushing erratically up into Niall's hand as he comes. 

He pants into Niall's neck for a moment after, body gone soft. Niall's hand is full of spunk and he has no idea what to do with it. He finds Louis' briefs and wipes off. 

"Ah, Niall, I have to wear those," Louis giggles, making no effort to stop him. He kisses Niall's neck, draws his earlobe into his mouth and brushes his teeth over it so that Niall shivers. It smells like sex and weed in the bunk, and Niall's hips are listless between Louis' legs. 

"Louis," he murmurs, "can you, like--" 

He doesn't know what he wants. He wants anything -- wants Louis, more, in this dark, stoned little space, than he's ever wanted anyone, and that's all he knows.

"Yeah," Louis says. "Tell me how you want it." His eyes are lidded as he reaches for Niall's cock. "What do you want, Niall," he breathes on a lazy smile into Niall's neck, stroking him slowly. Niall swallows down a noise, clutching closer to Louis, eyes squeezed shut in the crook of his shoulder.

"Put your legs over me," Louis says. Niall straddles his hips, feeling the catch of his wet dick beneath him. 

"D'you want me to talk?" Louis asks. His voice is so quiet it might be imagined. Niall's having trouble hanging onto the words, his mind a white haze. "I can talk," he says. "You have to be quiet." Niall nods frantically. 

Louis is still stroking him, languid, holding him with one arm around his shoulders. He hums quietly into Niall's neck, then says, "You could ride me like this," and it's so sexy that Niall's hips buck up into his hand, but Louis can't seem to keep it together. He swears quietly, sucking a mark in just behind Niall's ear. "All -- all spread open," he says, "fucking yourself on my dick like this." They both gasp. Louis licks a finger and drops his hand beneath Niall's bum, rubbing down between his cheeks and against his rim. "You'd be so tight for me, Niall," he breathes, and it sends Niall over the edge too soon, all those sensations, imagining Louis fucking him. He gasps into Louis' hair, hips jerking in his hands, coming in spurts onto his tan stomach.

"Shh," Louis says finally, long after it's warranted. He's still got Niall in his lap. He's just a little hard, Niall can feel it, but it's not enough to warrant doing anything about when he's this exhausted. He shifts off Louis, wincing at the tug in his overworked muscles. 

"Wanna sleep," Louis mumbles, smiling. 

"I'm staying." Niall stretches out beside him. "This is my bunk now. You've just got to deal with it."

"I wouldn't ask you to leave," Louis murmurs. Niall lets that wash over his fuzzy brain while Louis shifts about, pulling the covers over them. He doesn't say anything. Something else to process in the light of day. 

He shuts his eyes wishing he had some water, overheated, wrapped in Louis' arms. 

*

Niall can't remember having fallen asleep by the time he wakes up, the white light of morning prying in through the gap at the bottom of the curtain. He's on his back with the blankets half-kicked off and Louis like a furnace against him, one arm beneath his head and the other across Niall's chest. They're both naked and Louis is half-hard against Niall's hip. Niall can feel it. 

"Fuck," Niall mouths at the ceiling. He's holding very still, not that he has anywhere to go in this tiny space. He has no idea what time it is, but judging by the light outside they've probably got half an hour or more until they get in. 

He shifts gingerly so that he can look at Louis better, but he doesn't know how to wake him. Touching him at all seems too intimate given their current state, but just disentangling himself or being casual about it seems wrong by the same token. 

He settles for shaking Louis' shoulder gently and murmuring his name. Louis moves, softly at first, squinting. 

"Niall?" Then, "Oh."

"Morning," Niall says, grinning a little.

"We have to stop meeting like this," Louis rasps. He tries to move and then stops very abruptly, his hips half pulled away from Niall. "Shit." 

"It's okay," Niall says. There's no give in the way they're folded together; to pull apart they have to touch more. Niall's eyes are itching. He wonders where his clothes are. Louis blinks at him, fingers curling on his chest.

He kisses Niall, hesitant at first, his lips dry and warm. Niall closes his eyes, holding Louis with the hand trapped around his shoulders. He hadn't expected this. It's really nice to do it not stoned. 

Louis pulls back with this look on his face like he's asking for permission. Only then does it hit Niall how badly he wants to keep going. Until now it was an abstract, not clear-eyed right in front of him, a breathing, touching thing. 

He yanks Louis in with the arm around the back of his neck and another around his side, kissing him forcefully, not leaving any room for second thought. Louis gasps into it a little, melting against Niall. His morning semi rubs into Niall's hip and he twists, looking for that friction while Niall sucks on his lower lip, breathing hard through his nose. He's got Louis' soft hair twisted in his fingers and his hot skin under his hands and their stale mouths slick together, and it's mad, incredible, that Louis wants him like this, in the sober half-light of waking, and Niall can't get enough.

Louis' lost his breath when they break apart. "Pull me off," he gasps. Niall scrambles for him, trembling a little. He wraps his hand around Louis' dick and squeezes, dragging down with the precome at the tip so that he's got some slick to work with. Louis' breath is uneven into Niall's shoulder, Niall's arm thrust down between them. Then Louis reaches for him too.

"Fuck," Niall breathes, bucking up into Louis' hand. He can't believe they're doing this again, all the rustling and hoarse almost-words that are surely audible outside their little compartment, but Louis is stroking him hard and tight and it's impossible not to curse. 

"C'mon," Louis breathes. His eyes are open, heavy lashes a dark swoop in the low light. "Niall, kiss me." He bends his knees so they can get closer together. Niall hadn't known it was possible for a boy to be so pretty until he met Louis. He kisses him again, licks into his mouth, gasping when Louis quickens his rhythm.

"Keep up, Niall," Louis breathes into his cheek. There's sweat on his temple. Niall pushes his nose beneath Louis' jaw, kisses his neck, not thinking of whether he's leaving marks. 

"Louis," he gasps, punctuating it with sucking kisses into his skin, "Louis, Louis." He doesn't have any brainpower to spare for banter. He bites at the muscle of Louis' shoulder where it meets his collar and Louis hisses. His hips punch up into Niall's fist, his whole body trembling, and Niall knows now that that means he's close. Niall is close too. He wants them to come together. He's desperate for it. 

"With me," Louis says, just as Niall thinks it. "Are you -- Niall, are you gonna come?"

"Yeah." The sound breaks in the middle. The ache in Niall's arm from jacking Louis off is turning into hot sparks through his whole body, and Louis seems so little, curled between Niall and the back wall of the bunk, ducking his head into Niall's shoulder, panting.

"Now, love," Louis moans into the side of his neck, twisting his fist, and Niall does it for him. He has to bite down hard on his lower lip to keep from making noise as he shoots into Louis' hand, shaking through it. Louis is coming too before Niall's even done, choking off a silent cry into Niall's shoulder. 

They breathe hard against each other for a long time after, each one's hand gone slack on the other's dick, before Louis rolls onto his back in the narrow space, pushing his hair off his sweaty forehead with his clean hand. 

"Jesus Christ, Niall," he says. Niall's waiting for the other shoe to drop, panic flooding into the vulnerable blank space that comes after an orgasm like that. But Louis doesn't say anything else. 

Niall turns his head to look at him, smiling weakly. Louis smiles back at him, then stretches out and kisses him one more time, his hand soft and warm on Niall's cheek. 

"Where'd we put your clothes?" he asks softly when they break apart. Niall understands then that this is over.

"Somewhere in here, I reckon," he says, kicking his feet at the disheveled bedding. It dislodges his sweatpants, which is enough. He wriggles into them, cackling a little as Louis picks up his own dirty briefs on one prissy finger. 

"See you in a minute, okay?" Louis says. 

"Yeah," Niall says. He peeks out from the curtain and, finding the coast clear, drops down. His phone is blinking mournfully with low battery on the table in the back, beside his guitar and the leavings of their little party from really only a few hours earlier. He finds someone's charger and someone's shirt -- Liam's, maybe, meaning borrowed by Zayn -- and scrolls unseeingly through Twitter, feeling pitifully overwhelmed by trying to understand what just happened.

Zayn's up first. He glances at the back of the bus when he emerges, waves to Niall, then pads off to the loo. No one else seems to think anything's out of the ordinary, either, or they don't let on if they do. Niall wonders if they're wondering why he's changed his shirt or where he slept. Or would it be so bad if he bunked up with Louis? Probably -- the beds are too small to make that seem normal. 

There's 20 minutes until they get into Stockholm, but Louis doesn't emerge until just when he needs to. All Niall's decided by the time they pull to a stop at the hotel is that it's more than a one-time lark, this thing with Louis, it has to be. He's also decided that he can't blame it on the drugs. This seems somehow unfortunate. 

*

Niall's being stupid, of course. Zayn's not oblivious, and even if he was it shouldn't come as a surprise that he knows something's up. He finds Niall near the bleary end of their hotel party in Sweden, watching Liam and Louis play beer pong. The show was completely standard, and then Louis has proceeded to avoid him all night. Not totally shocking, but that doesn't make it feel much better. 

"You alright, mate?" Zayn asks, sinking down next to Niall on the couch. He's got a beer in his hand. Niall is drinking something whiskey-based that Harry concocted for him. It contains a lot of Maraschino cherries, which Niall is fishing out and popping into his mouth one by one. 

"Can't complain," he says around a half-knotted cherry stem. He sticks his tongue out to show it to Zayn. 

"Very impressive," Zayn says, smiling. He touches Niall on the back of the neck, squinting at his face. Absently, Niall checks the sensation of that touch against the memory of Louis'. It's different, of course it is. He'd never realized that before. Maybe it hadn't always been that way. He'd never had cause to check whether he felt differently about Louis than anyone else. 

"So, not smoking tonight, are you?" Zayn says. 

"Nah," Niall says. He spits the cherry stem into his drink. "Is anyone?" 

"Don't think so." Zayn takes a pull of his beer. "Last night, then, was that just -- were you just, like…" He struggles for the words. Niall thinks he knows what might be coming and doesn't want to make the suggestion. "Have you been smoking with Louis before?"

"Just once," Niall says into the lip of his drink. Liam and Louis are having a heated argument over whose house beer pong rules apply when they're in neutral territory, involving much posturing and fingers jammed into chests and collapsing into giggles and punching each other. Niall watches them, frowning. 

"You like it, then?"

"What?" Niall turns back. Zayn's still studying him. Niall is both too drunk and not drunk enough to have this conversation. "It's alright." He shrugs. "I don't mind it."

Zayn's expression turns bemused. "You don't _have_ to do it, Niall," he says. "Don't let him boss you around." 

"I won't," Niall promises him. He barely knows what he's agreeing to.

"So -- are you two okay, then, or--"

"Fine," Niall says over him. "Just. Yeah, fine."

Zayn frowns slightly. "Okay," he says. "I don't like to see you sad." 

"I'm not sad."

"Okay, mate." He pinches Niall's side. "I'm off. Enjoy, yeah?"

"G'night, Zee."

Niall stares into his drink for a while after that. He is sad, that's the shitty part. It had been so much easier when he could pretend he wasn't. He looks up at Louis leaning against the opposite wall while Liam changes something on the stereo. Their eyes meet for a moment, and Niall smiles on reflex. Louis smiles back, too quick, and then he looks down. 

Niall doesn't know what he's done wrong. He doesn't know about anything. He's rather drunk. 

He looks up a short while later, not realizing he'd kind of nodded off against his own chest, to find Liam's hand on his shoulder. 

"Oi," he says, "Tommo and I are just about to go smoke, want to join?"

"No," Niall grunts, looking around. Louis is nowhere to be seen. 

"Worried about your voice, are you?" Liam asks seriously.

"Yes," Niall says, just to answer. He wants very badly to be out of this conversation. 

"I should probably be thinking about that more," Liam says, frowning. 

"You're fine," Niall sighs. "Once in a while, innit."

"Yeah," Liam says. He grins. "So -- okay, then. I'll just tell Louis -- I'll just. I'll see you tomorrow, yeah?"

"Okay," Niall says. He watches him go, then eats the last boozy cherry in his drink and points himself, stumbling, in the direction of his room. 

* 

"Morrrrning."

Harry's voice is very close to Niall's face. When he opens to eyes it's to find that Harry himself is also very close to Niall's face. He jolts back. 

"Oh, nice to see you too," Harry says. 

"Sorry," Niall grunts, flailing about. "Wasn't expecting company."

"I've only been here a second. Louis sent me to see if you were awake."

"What?" Niall sits up slowly, blinking. He has several questions, not least of which relate to his urgent need for a large quantity of water and Ibuprofen. "So you woke me up?" he says finally.

Harry grins. "It seemed easier."

"How'd you get in?"

"Nicked the master key off Paul."

"What does Louis want, then?" Niall points churlishly for the water bottle he's just spotted on the table behind Harry. Harry passes it to him. "Thanks."

"He didn't say, specifically," Harry says. "I think he might want to get breakfast." 

"Where?"

"No, I think he wants to order up in here."

Niall frowns. "Why's he sent you, then?" 

"Dunno, do I," Harry said. "Figured you two were having, like, issues." 

"Oh." It settles like a stone in Niall's stomach. 

"You are, then?" 

Harry can be too shrewd for his own good sometimes. "I don't know." Niall's mouth ducks, and he looks away. There's a moment where he wrestles with asking Harry, but he doesn't even know what the question is. "Louis' just--" he tries. "I just think we're both..." 

"A bit stupid," Harry supplies.

"Yeah." Niall lobs a pillow at him. "Now fuck off and tell him I'm alive or whatever. What do we even have texting for, anyway?" 

Harry salutes, clambering to his feet. 

"Hey," he says from by the doorway. "I told him not to mess you about. So. I hope he doesn't." 

Niall is too vaguely hungover and full of emotional turmoil not to feel extremely touched by this. "Thanks, Harry." 

"My pleasure." Harry withdraws backwards from the room, enigmatic and ephemeral, as is his way. 

Niall's checking his phone when a new text comes in. 

_Harry get to you yet? Haha_

It's Louis. _Afraid so !_ he types back. 

_Order me some eggs or something be over in a bit :)_

The frustration hits Niall out of nowhere as he reads it. Why should Louis get to act like everything's fucked up one minute and fine the next? Louis has been calling the shots on this since the beginning. This -- whatever _this_ is, whatever beginning it had. Niall supposes it was the first time he let Louis smoke him up. Maybe before. He doesn't know why he'd started doing that, tagging along to watch. 

He makes the call to room service and then lies back in bed, staring pissily at the ceiling, trying to work out just what it is he's so pissed off about. He feels like he's not been treated fairly, is basically it, but he also doesn't know what sort of situation they're in that would beg a different kind of treatment than any other.

There's a soft knock on the door after a while, the quick patter of Louis' customary rhythm. Niall mimes it absently against the sideboard as he gets up to answer it.

"'ello, Niall." Louis is grinning at him, and Niall has a split second to decide whether to keep sulking or smile back, like Louis makes him want to. 

He smiles. "Just ordered breakfast," he says, stepping back to let Louis in.

"Excellent." Louis claps his hands, plopping down on the edge of Niall's bed and making the duvet jump. "I come bearing gifts." He produces a pair of joints from his pocket, fanning them out between his fingers like a royal flush. 

"Oh," Niall says. "Bro, I just woke up." 

"Wake and bake!" Louis exclaims. "You've not tasted scrambled eggs 'til you've tasted them high, mate." 

Niall frowns. "I'm good," he says. The irritation is biting at the back of his throat again, but he doesn't voice it. Instead he curls up at the top of the bed in the nest where he'd been lying before, just watching Louis, waiting. 

"Alright," Louis says, putting the joints back in his pocket. "What's up with you, then?" 

"What's up with _us_?" Niall answers in a rush. He feels color in his cheeks, but he keeps his eyes on Louis. "I've just been feeling weird," he adds, softer. 

Louis is looking at him intently, turned with one knee up on the bed to face him. "Weird how?"

"Like -- when you're high, when we're high, we keep…" he winces. "Hooking up, or whatever. And I just. And the other morning, and then -- I'm just trying to--"

"Niall," Louis says. He's chewing on his lower lip. "It's just, I mean, it's just sex." 

Louis can be a dick sometimes. "Stoned sex."

"Yeah."

"So the other morning? When we weren't? And then you wouldn't -- you didn't talk to me all night." Niall's voice drops off halfway through it. He can't look at Louis anymore. 

Louis crawls up the bed to sit beside him, back to the headboard, knees akimbo. He folds his hands in his lap, tangling his fingers in a knot. 

"I don't know why I did that," he says, low. Niall's kind of surprised. He hadn't expected Louis to own up to it -- had even thought he might have half-imagined it himself. 

"But I just don't know if it's a good idea," Louis says after a moment.

The knock on the door comes as Niall's processing this, the way one processes an unexpected punch to the chest. Louis gets up to answer it and comes back a short stretch later with the tray. 

"Food," he says, smiling a little. He sets it down in front of them and climbs back into his spot, an obvious distance away from Niall. Niall pulls his plate toward him and picks up a piece of toast just for something to do.

"But you say all that like it's all me," he says with his mouth full. "Not a good idea, like, that isn't fair. You keep… you keep kissing me." 

Louis doesn't answer for a moment, chewing on a mouthful of eggs. Then he steals Niall's uneaten crust of toast out of his hand, pointing it at him inquisitively. Niall lets him do it and feels gutted. He'd never let anyone else steal his food like that. He's in so much deeper than he'd realized when he started this conversation. 

"We can't just, like, get off with each other as mates sometimes?" Louis asks deliberately. 

"Sure, like," Niall says. 

"So… okay, then. Great. It's decided." Louis waggles his eyebrows.

Niall huffs out a laugh. "Louis," he mutters. He's miserable and he can't possibly ever communicate why. 

Louis' face softens a little as he looks at Niall. He smiles. "Hey," he says. "I don't even really know what we're talking about, do you?"

"No, not really." Niall kind of laughs in spite of himself. 

They clear their plates in halting silence, talking a bit about the upcoming tour stops and what everyone else got up to last night. 

"You want me to go, then?" Louis asks afterward.

"No," Niall says, too quickly. 

Louis' eyebrows knit together. "Do you… hm." He pulls the joints out of his pocket and sets them on the bedspread between them. "Here. Your need is greater than mine." 

Niall just stares at Louis as he stands up. 

"I should go," he says, pointing his thumb toward the door.

Niall shrugs. 

Louis regards him earnestly from the foot of the bed. "Don't worry about it, Niall," he says. "'s just a bit of fun." 

Niall picks up one of the joints, rolling it between his fingers. "I'll see you later?" he asks. 

Louis grins at him. "Sure." 

"Okay," Niall says. He's still considering the joints. 

Louis waffles like he's going to say something else. Finally he goes, "Oh, have this as well," and he tosses Niall his silver Zippo. Niall catches it, easily. Then Louis is going, the door shutting Niall into soundproof quiet after him. 

It's a proper day off, their first in a long time, and Niall munches on the crust -- _his_ crust -- that Louis had left behind, considering the many ways in which he could spend today sullenly doing nothing. 

He has a wank in the shower, then scrambles to the phone for a radio interview he remembers last-minute, hoping he sounds like himself, remembering very little of his answers after. Then there really is nothing left to do. 

He ends up with the shower running again and the fan on in the bathroom, lying on the floor in a pile of towels, sparking up one of the joints Louis had left. He thinks he heard somewhere that you won't set off smoke detectors in a room full of steam. Anyway, there isn't a balcony and it feels stupid to sit in a chair by the window, so whatever. It takes him a while to figure out which end of the thing to light. 

Louis' Zippo has his initials engraved on it. Pretty. It must have been a gift, or else Louis is a ridiculous ponce, which wouldn't be a huge plot twist. Niall taps the ash off the end of the joint into the sink and pours himself a glass of water. On second thought, he gets his laptop and puts on John Mayer. _Who says I can't get stoned?_

It feels good to lie on the floor and think about nothing. Weed kind of levels him out in this weird way, where nothing's surprising. He wonders if Louis had meant him to sit here smoking these blunts thinking about the two of them, or if he'd meant him to smoke them and forget. Louis just smokes weed because he wants to, because he's stressed out and tired, because he doesn't care. Niall doesn't know why _he_ smokes it. Probably because he does care, but not about the right things. But that doesn't make sense. 

He cares about Louis. He wants to like the same stuff he likes, because Louis is cool and clever and he likes it when Niall follows him, likes having Niall on his side. It feels good to make him happy. Niall loves him. Of course he does. And Louis loves him back. 

He sucks in another toke of the joint. He keeps forgetting to smoke it in between hits, so that it's halfway burned down already. This seems like a totally uneconomical way to smoke weed. Then again, they don't exactly have to worry about affording more. 

He thinks a bit about kissing Louis, about the weight of Louis' dick on the back of his tongue. He's half hard in his sweats but he's too lazy to do anything besides letting his hand rest there lightly, applying pressure with the heel of his palm. There are so many things he wants to do, images of himself with Louis, that he can't keep them straight. 

His next hit spirals into the vent high up on the ceiling. He's left the lights on. Why had he done that? And it's cold on the floor. The fucking floor, of all places to hang out. He pulls his towels around himself a bit more and tries to blow a smoke ring with his next hit. His throat and eyes are dry and his lungs feel burnt. They're probably mad at him. 

He's sad, then. Louis knows how to do all this stuff. He doesn't put all this thought into it and mess it up. Or maybe he is putting thought into it, and he's just arriving at a different outcome than Niall. Niall isn't sure which would be worse. 

"Don't mess him about," he mutters to himself. What Harry had said. He's being stupid. Christ, he's being insane. He had Louis -- has Louis -- and he's fucking it up over something he doesn't even have words for. 

Louis is the best thing. It's so obvious he's what Niall's wanted, or else he wouldn't have gone tagging after him, wouldn't have let him smoke him up, wouldn't have let him kiss him, touch him, string him along. The thought makes Niall laugh a little, hiccuping.

He stubs the joint out in the sink, turns the shower off, leaves the fan on, then totters out into his room swaddled in his towels, which smell rough and warm and skunky, carrying his laptop in one hand. He actually feels good. Funny, how weed does that.

*

All Niall's done by the time the knock comes on the door late that afternoon is eat half the minibar and some of the emergency snacks in his kit and learn some new songs on guitar. He's mostly unstoned, feeling tired and bleary. 

It doesn't occur to him the person outside is going to be Louis when he answers it. 

"Oh, hey," he says, stumbling back a little as Louis surges inside.

"Hi." Louis sniffs. "Jesus, did you blaze?"

"Yeah," Niall says sheepishly. 

"Good on you," Louis says, giving him a delighted little fist-bump. "Are you high now?"

"Not really," Niall says, considering. "No, I don't think so." 

"Good, 'cause, okay," Louis says. He turns and locks and bolts the door behind him, then steps back into the room, just inside the boundary of Niall's space.

"Harry told me not to mess you about," he says. "Actually I think everyone's told me, in their way."

"What? Do they all, like --" 

"No, no, everyone's an idiot," Louis says, waving him off. "But. I've been doing a bit of thinking. And Harry told me not to mess you about," he says again, taking a step forward. All his nervous energy is smoothing into something slow and private, and he hooks his hands in the pockets of Niall's hoodie. "So I'm not going to," he says, and he kisses him. 

It takes a lot of effort for Niall not to collapse into it, sobbing, perhaps, clutching at Louis' shoulders, but he keeps his dignity. "Wait," he mumbles, trying to pull back and kiss Louis at the same time, "wait, wait." Louis pulls back by a fraction, but his hands are all over Niall, around his sides and over his shoulderblades and at his ruddy cheeks. 

"How is this considered not messing me about?" Niall asks. His eyes flick between Louis' eyes and down to his mouth. 

"Because -- it's what you want," Louis says. "And, I think I just." He licks his lips. "I was just being a bit of an arse." 

"Is it what _you_ want?" Niall asks weakly. 

"Yeah," Louis says, low, right up against Niall so that he shudders. He presses his lips to Niall's neck, murmuring on a warm breath, "I thought we'd fuck it up. Like, I thought we'd fuck us up, know what I mean?"

"Yeah," Niall sighs. He tips his face into the crook of Louis' shoulders, wrapped up in him now. It feels so good to be held. Louis smells amazing. Niall could keep his nose right here forever. 

"D'you still think it's a bad idea?" he mumbles.

Louis pulls back to look at him, a devilish grin on his wet mouth. "Don't care," he says. 

"Oh good," Niall says, and suddenly he's scrabbling at Louis' t-shirt, "good, me neither," and Louis laughs and yanks down the zip of Niall's hoodie and kisses him again, trips them backward until the backs of Niall's knees hit the edge of the bed and they both fall. 

"Did you have some _epiphanies_ today, my little protégé?" Louis asks, crinkling his nose into Niall's cheek while Niall wriggles out of his clothes in random order. 

"Yeah," Niall gasps. 

"Like what?"

"Like, I want you to fuck me," Niall says. 

Louis bursts out laughing. 

"Oh my god," he says, sounding very overwhelmed. Niall's rather pleased to see the flush rise in his cheeks. "Did you really? Like, while you were smoking?"

"Maybe just now," Niall says. "Don't know for sure." 

Louis can't seem to keep the smile from tugging his mouth, into the corners of his eyes. It's infectious. "Aw, Niall," he murmurs, looking down at him from above. It's hilarious to hear him treat it like it's something sweet and touching. He's golden and blurry-edged in the backlight and he's all Niall's, every inch of him. 

"C'mere," Niall says. Louis pulls off his shirt and leans down. 

He pushes his tongue into Niall's mouth like he can't get enough of the taste of him, pulling at Niall's thighs until he spreads his legs and Louis can wriggle between them. He bites at Niall's collarbone, licking along the rut of it and making Niall moan and twist, crowding them together with his heels locked behind Louis' bum. 

"God," Louis says, pushing his hips against Niall's in a useless rhythm, trying to find the right way to slot against Niall's bare dick while he's still in his trackies. "God, I like you. You're so -- Niall, just -- right there --" 

Niall gasps brokenly as Louis grinds into him in a long line, circling his hips down and doing it again and again, more shallow now, quicker. It's perfect, expect Louis is still wearing clothes. Niall digs his fingers into Louis' waistband, breath catching with each little thrust of Louis' hips. 

"But I like you so much," Louis blurts, then laughs at himself, breath coming in bursts. 

"Glad you've realized," Niall says, tugging uselessly at Louis' sweatpants.

"Niall!" Louis sounds scandalized. He pulls back, hips stilling. Niall groans. "I have not _just_ realized."

"Okay," Niall says, "now can you shut up?"

"I knew," Louis murmurs, fumbling out of the rest of his clothes. It makes Niall feel dizzy, almost, looking at him. He tries to focus on what Louis is saying. "I always _knew_ , like, I was just being a tit."

"Yeah," Niall breathes. He's laughing and shaking at the same time and he can barely find his voice. Louis is golden everywhere, his soft stomach, the lines of him and the curves and his cock, hard and blushing, bobbing between his legs. Niall drinks him in. 

"I like you so much, too," he says, long after the moment has passed.

"D'you still…" Louis reaches for his hand and laces their fingers together, stroking Niall's palm with his thumb. "Do you want me to fuck you, Niall?" 

Niall's fingers tighten around Louis'. He nods, breathless. 

"Okay," Louis whispers. He looks at Niall a moment longer. "Do you have stuff for it?"

"I think, in my bag -- I mean, in the loo." 

"Good boy." Louis scrambles off the bed and disappears for a moment. Niall's cock is feeling neglected. He thumbs against it lightly, just enough to keep him there, thinking of what comes next. He works his lower lip into his mouth and rolls it around between his teeth.

Louis comes back with a condom and lube, grinning when he sees Niall still laid out naked on the bed. "Look at you," he tuts. "No shame."

"None at all," Niall agrees, turning his head to look at Louis standing at the side of the bed. His dick is at eye level and it makes Niall's mouth water a bit. 

"You promise you're not still high, yeah?" Louis climbs up next to him, kneeling. 

"I promise." Niall actually thinks about it for a moment, then, and shakes his head. "No. I promise." 

"Good," Louis says. He bends to bite at Niall's nipple lightly, flicking his tongue over it until Niall is squirming, his knees curling up. He mumbles into Niall's chest, "I didn't want, like, your first time to be… I want to do it right."

It's getting to be too much for Niall when Louis says stuff like that, when he wants him so badly. He props himself up on his elbows and reaches out. Louis meets him in the middle easily, wrapping his arms around Niall. Niall's fingers slide into Louis' hair and they kiss, messy and slow, tongues slipping together. 

"We can try it high later," Louis says in a stage whisper against Niall's lips, and Niall giggles. "Now lie down." He grabs a pillow and shoves it under Niall's hips on the bed, leaning in to kiss Niall's stomach, then lower. He licks a stripe up Niall's cock without warning and Niall jerks beneath him.

"Louis!" 

"Sorry, got distracted," Louis giggles. He wraps a hand around Niall anyway, though, licks at him a bit more, sucking wet kisses up under the head of his cock. Niall's hips are bucking weakly.

"Stop, stop," he moans, "Jesus, you're gonna make me come."

"That's the plan," Louis murmurs. He spreads Niall's legs on either side of him and slicks up his fingers with the lube. 

It starts with one fingertip, circling around Niall's rim, before Louis pushes it inside to the knuckle. Niall is breathing slowly, propped up on his elbows to watch.

"Lie back, babe," Louis murmurs. Niall does, reluctantly, his mind full of the feeling once he can't look at Louis anymore. Louis pushes in deeper, holding Niall's hip with his other hand to keep him steady, until Niall's bearing down on him without even knowing he's doing it, sucking his lower lip into his mouth again. 

"That okay?" Louis asks. Niall nods rapidly. "God, you're tight. Remember I said I'd fuck you, how tight you'd be for me, d'you remember that?"

"I remember," Niall groans, "Louis--"

Louis slips a second finger in alongside the first, fucking Niall in short strokes until Niall is panting, body tense and trembling. Louis spreads his hand on Niall's stomach, pressing down gently, then curls his fingers deeper in until he brushes Niall's prostate, just once, enough to make Niall's hips stab up for how far it is from enough. 

"Do that again," Niall says. 

"Manners," Louis says, sliding his fingers back and forth. 

"Louis, please."

Louis does it again, and then again, harder. Niall sobs. 

There's more lube and the same fingers, spreading Niall apart and fucking as deep into him as Louis can get, until Niall is arching up, shoulders pressed into the duvet. 

"Okay, okay," he gasps. "Now, oh, Christ. Please." 

Louis pulls his fingers away and tears open the condom packet with his teeth, rolling it on. He spills more of the lube into his palm and slicks it down himself, squeezing once for good measure, before he's settling over Niall, hitching Niall's legs back further. The blunt head of his cock nudges Niall's entrance. 

"I can't believe we're doing this," he breathes, looking Niall up and down.

"Jesus Christ," Niall groans, wrapping his legs around Louis' waist. "Fucking -- just do it already."

Louis bends to kiss him, arms straining on either side of Niall's head. He sucks on his tongue as he pulls back, and it's wet and dirty and it makes Niall's cock twitch against his stomach. 

He pushes just the head of his cock into Niall, watching the point where they meet, mouth open and breathing a bit ragged. Niall's toes curl behind his back.

"Easy, love," Louis murmurs. "Relax." He pulls out and then pushes back in, just an inch, then another, opening Niall up with shallow thrusts. Niall reaches out for him blindly, gripping his shoulders when Louis bends toward him. The change in angle takes him deeper, and Niall pushes down to meet him, his whole body alight with something on a burning edge. His breath comes on bursts of sound each time Louis moves.

Louis rocks into Niall so slowly, for what feels like forever, before he bottoms out. Niall can't think straight, aching with heat, and he has to palm himself for just a second for some relief. He can't close his eyes because he has to look up at Louis but can't keep them open because he's so full of Louis' cock that he thinks he's going to die. It hurts and it's real and it's so good. 

"I'm gonna fuck you now," Louis says. His voice is strained. "Niall, are you okay? Are you good?"

"I'm good," Niall gasps. He scrabbles at Louis' back with his blunt nails, pulling him in for a kiss. Louis edges his hips back and then presses in again, timed with the thrust of his tongue into Niall's mouth. Niall pants into the kiss, feeling winded. 

Louis' next thrust pushes Niall's hips back, his knees up around Louis sides. "Oh, fuck," Niall moans, loud. "Fuck, fuck."

Louis is less noisy than Niall had imagined he would be when they were high and had to keep quiet, but he's starting to break now, little noises punching out of him each time he fucks into Niall, picking up speed. Niall is making noise, too, he's pretty sure, but he has no idea what he's saying, if it's even anything. He's completely gone. It feels like Louis is going to fuck him forever. He wants it. He wants this more than anything.

"That's good," Louis moans, "so good for me, Niall, just like that." Niall's hips are pushing down haphazardly to meet Louis', arms locked around his back, and sometimes they're kissing and sometimes Niall is just gasping into the corner of Louis' jaw. 

"Fuck, I'm gonna come." Louis' hips stutter against Niall's, and Niall tries to tell him yes, please, it's okay, but all that comes out is a sob. "Niall," Louis whimpers, and his hips jerk, flush against Niall, his balls gone tight. Then he's coming, pushed in deeper than Niall had thought he could take him, trembling through it with his face in Niall's shoulder. 

Niall can't even say or do anything before Louis is picking himself up and sealing their mouths together, one hand fumbling around Niall's dick, spreading the precome shining at the tip down the length of him and jerking him off fast and rough. His hand keeps slipping, he's so boneless, but he pulls Niall off like he means it. 

"I want you to come," he says, muffled, into Niall's mouth. He's still inside him, and Niall feels slippery with lube between his legs. "Can you come for me, Nialler?"

"Louis," Niall gasps. His hips tick up into the rhythm of Louis' hand, eyes squeezed shut. Louis sucks his lower lip into his mouth, biting at it, letting Niall fuck into his hand, until Niall careens over the edge, jerking in Louis' arms, gasping soundlessly as he comes between them. 

There's a moment where he's coming down, where he still doesn't know who or where he is, and then Louis slips out of him gently and it makes him squirm and sigh. He just lies on his back, panting, while Louis gets up to deal with the condom and wipe himself down. There are tissues on the bedside table. Niall reaches out for one with numb fingers after a moment, scrubbing lazily at the come on his chest and stomach. Then the bed jumps. Louis, falling beside him. 

"You did so good, love," Louis murmurs, dozy eyes sparkling. He touches Niall's cheek and leans in to kiss him, sweetly. It makes Niall ache deep inside his chest. He doesn't know what to say. 

"Louis," he tries for a start. It comes out all love-struck and soft and, after a moment, they both laugh. 

"Niall," Louis says in kind. "Did you smoke both of those joints?"

"Oh my god, no," Niall says. "You're a genius. It's just there." He points to the bedside table over Louis' shoulder. "Should we…?" He gestures vaguely to the smoke detector overhead. His arm feels like it's made of rubber. 

The joint is hanging out of Louis' mouth. He's all tousled and marked up and he looks completely ridiculous and it's absolutely the sexiest thing Niall has ever seen. "I could, like, tamper with it," he muses. "Or we could just…"

Niall laughs. It's silly, maybe, but he can't remember the last time he was this happy.

They wind up on the bathroom floor again, shower running, fan on. They're both naked, still, giggling with their knees against their chests in nests of towels and bedclothes. Louis keeps touching Niall's fingers when he passes him the joint. Niall can remember a time not so long ago when he would have kept himself up later on over-analyzing those touches. It's amazing, now, that he doesn't have to.

"High sex," Louis comments, puffing on the joint. Niall nods intently. 

"Yes," he says. "Please, go on."

Louis giggles, shoving lightly at Niall's shoulder. "We should do that. Again. Later." He tweaks Niall's nipples with both hands out of nowhere. Niall chokes on his hit. 

Louis laughs as Niall coughs. "I'm sorry," he says, laughing, "oh no, I'm sorry, Niall." He gets him water, still giggling.

"Fucker," Niall manages. It's hard to sound fond when you can barely breathe, but he thinks it fondly, which is what counts. 

Louis rubs his back while he drinks his water and swallows down the rest of the coughing fit. The small, warm circles of his hand feel like they could cure any ill. Niall just smiles at him blearily after, watching him stub out the spent roach in the bottom of Niall's empty glass. Louis smiles too, and then they're just smiling at each other, stoned and blissful. 

"Alright," Louis says finally. "Let's order room service and watch YouTube videos and prank call to Liam, and then afterwards I'll blow you."

Niall cackles. "You have the best ideas." He lets Louis pull him to his feet, both of them slipping into each other's arms accidentally-on-purpose in all the linens on the floor. 

Louis kisses him, one arm around Niall's waist and the other around his shoulders. It would be exceedingly romantic if they weren't high and standing naked in a bathroom among Niall's post-coital bedsheets and used towels. Maybe it's more romantic for it. Niall can't stop smiling.

"I really like this," he says. "I want to do it all the time." 

"You're always invited, man," Louis says. "Four of us toking up, now, we just have to get Harry, eh?"

"I mean -- all of this, you know." Niall blushes, giggling into Louis' shoulder. "I like..." He bursts out laughing. He has to say it. "I like having sex with you."

"Wow, Niall," Louis says, shaking his head. His grin is spreading impossibly wide across his face. "I also enjoy having sex with you."

"No," Niall says, trying to collect himself. "No, but this… thing. This is good, yeah?" He licks his lips, heart jumping a bit with the effort of figuring out how to say it. "You and me?"

Louis looks at him for a moment, and there's something there that makes Niall's heart swell -- a gratitude like he'd thought only he was feeling, and even that would have been okay. But Louis is really looking at him. It's addictive, having this boy's eyes on him like that. Niall feels like he's floating on air. 

"You and me," Louis murmurs finally. He smiles to himself, then smiles at Niall, cups his cheek and kisses him again for a long time. 

"C'mon," he says after, stepping back to turn off the shower. "I'm gonna order the most expensive thing on the menu." 

"Even if it's gross?"

"Especially if it's gross." They're both laughing, and Louis takes Niall's hand. Niall remembers to grab his duvet before he lets Louis lead him back to bed.


End file.
